Oden Island Nature Preserve

Oden Island Nature Preserve is a 50-acre forested natural area with nearly a mile of frontage on Crooked Lake. A couple of upland ridges occur along the middle of the preserve. These drier upland areas are unique and don’t fit a Michigan Natural Features Inventory classification very well, they are likely a variation of Mesic Northern Forest, but have characteristics of an inland Boreal Forest community type. There are a handful of emergent marsh pockets along the shoreline that comprise important nearshore aquatic habitats. The forests on the preserve are mature and contain many large trees, especially eastern hemlocks, white pine, and some large sugar maples. There have not been any timber harvests since the 1950’s, according to aerial imagery, and it has likely been much longer since any logging, and some trees might even predate the logging boom of the late 1800’s. Thus, portions of the forest in the Oden Island Nature Preserve approach old-growth forest characteristics.